designing VU meters and spectrum analyzer...

at the moment im buying components to build a pair of VU meters to put in the car...im having trouble finding some ICs, and im using a computer parallel port interface to wire the LEDs to the "base unit" so i can have the box with the actual meter behind the dash and the LEDs through the peice of plastic going down the frame between the front windows and the windshield. i plan to build a spectrum analyzer but i dont know how i wanna apply it...if i could find wafer LEDs then i could make it real big and it would be freakin awesome- i could fill up the entire back winshield or somethin...im posting cuz i need ideas as to where to put it in. anyoine with any ideas or comments let me know what you think. and if anyone knows where i can get giant leds (other than radio shack) let me know
thanks a lot
-pat